Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, HOME AND COUNTRY, by JOHN NICOL


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HOME AND COUNTRY, by                    
First Line: Vexed with the toils and troubles of the day
Last Line: Will shut my eyes among the friends I love.
Subject(s): Home; Patriotism


VEXED with the toils and troubles of the day
I gladly hasten to my humble home,
Where peace and pleasure soon drives care away,
Where vice or sorrow seldom ever come.
How sweet it is, when one has been annoy'd,
To find one's self with homely tasks employ'd.

No joys so pure as those we find at home,
No friends so true as those with whom we dwell
All hearts beat back, however far they roam,
To some dear mountain, valley, plain, or dell.
One cannot find, no, not in all the earth,
A place so sweet as is one's place of birth.

Land of the brave, land of the free and fair,
Thy every spot is classic, holy ground,
Where love and truth attune thy lyric air,
And peace and plenty scatter blessings round;
Though dark thy glens, though bleak thy rugged hills,
Thy very name thy child with transport fills.

Nor will I wander from my native vale,
To seek a fortune in a land of slaves;
But I will breathe bold Britain's genial gale,
And leave my bones beside my grandsires' graves;
And, looking up for greater bliss above,
Will shut my eyes among the friends I love.





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